


Boy Problems, Who's Got 'em?

by millepertuis



Category: Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (TV)
Genre: Attempts at Personal Growth, Developing Relationship, F/F, No Magical Healing Sexual Organs Therein, Post-Season/Series 02, Rebecca's Issues, Sexuality Crisis, Some Canon-Typical Questionable Behavior
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-07
Updated: 2017-10-07
Packaged: 2019-01-10 09:45:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12296574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/millepertuis/pseuds/millepertuis
Summary: The whole thing with Valencia had started a few weeks ago.





	Boy Problems, Who's Got 'em?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DCBrierton](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DCBrierton/gifts).



> Title from Carly Rae Jepsen's song _Boy Problems_.
> 
> Additional warnings for off-screen sex, mentions of past relationships, some internalized homophobia and misogyny, and references to menstruation.

 

 

 

“Look,” Darryl said, “if you keep bringing us more clients, we’re going to have to hire more people, and I’ve only just gotten the office dynamics right again.”

“Uh-huh,” Rebecca said, and kept looking through Josh’s Facebook page. Lots of selfies in his priest habit. Was he even supposed to have one yet?

“Also…” He paused, and then spoke very fast: “Please don’t meddle in my relationship with Josh, we’re very happy!”

Rebecca felt his apprehension to be very unfair, and did not hesitate to tell him so. Only three of the four dates she’d set Maya up on had ended in disaster, which were pretty good odds in Rebecca’s experience. And Paula was certainly not complaining about Rebecca’s slight interventions.

“About that,” Paula said, popping up. Rebecca hurriedly closed the Facebook tab.

She had promised Paula she would delete all the fake accounts she had made to—yes, alright, to spy on Josh—and she had, mostly. She just couldn’t bring herself to delete the Fake Chan Cousin account. It had been such a masterstroke, after all: fake college classmates were amateur stuff, but a made-up family member? That took skill. Also time, effort, and good Internet stalking skills. And a few of Josh’s real cousins had gotten so attached to Brandon. Chad had been so disappointed that Brandon couldn’t make it to the last family reunion. (All male Chan family members were named like they had recently escaped from a frat. It was particularly unfortunate for Chad Chan.) What would Chad think, if Brandon just disappeared out of the blue? Rebecca simply couldn’t break those hard-won friendships like that.

She deleted her Internet history just in case and smiled sunnily at Paula, who smiled back with a certain reserve.

“Please stop devising plans to test my husband’s faithfulness,” Paula said. “He’s eventually going to succumb to one of them and then I’m going to have to murder him or divorce him, and we have kids, Rebecca! Those little monsters are a two-person job!”

Rebecca’s phone pinged.

_SOS_ , the text read.

It was from Valencia.

 

 

 

It took sixteen minutes to get from Rebecca’s office to Valencia’s when you ignored most traffic laws, and twenty-eight minutes to calm down both the middle-aged couple that she’d found yelling at an uncaring Valencia while she typed on her phone and the young woman in a white dress who was sobbing loudly on Valencia’s uncomfortable sofa. All in all much quicker than the first few times this had happened.

It was the fourth wedding Valencia had taken on since—since she had decided to become a wedding planner, and it was somehow the seventh time Rebecca had been called in when someone threatened to sue. Generally the parents of the bride. Rebecca had developed a whole spiel about how they didn’t want the bride to have a meltdown on her wedding day, and Valencia’s methods—or general personality—guaranteed the meltdown would be taken care of well beforehand.

“And besides,” Rebecca concluded, “even if she does decide she doesn’t want to go through with the wedding after all, wouldn’t you prefer it happened now, months in advance, rather than once it’s too late for any refunds?”

Which rather took care of that.

Valencia’s attention hadn’t seemed to waver from her phone the whole time, but her eyes trailed to Rebecca after she had seen everyone to the door. “It’s pretty hot,” she said, “to see you arguing your case like this.”

Rebecca felt herself flush. “Oh?” she croaked, but Valencia was already back on her phone, typing something out before sliding it into her purse.

“Are you done for the day?” she asked.

“Yes,” Rebecca answered decisively. It was already two in the afternoon, there really was no point in going back to work. Plus, they really needed to have another talk about what constituted an emergency.

Valencia examined her nails. “Do you want to…?”

Rebecca flushed anew. “Now?” she asked, but the answer to that seemed obvious. “Here?”

Valencia shrugged.

Rebecca eyed the sofa. It really _was_ terribly uncomfortable, and Rebecca had back problems.

“Alright,” she said.

 

 

 

The whole thing with Valencia had started a few weeks ago. They were having a girls’ night. Well, they were staying home, binge-watching _Grace and Frankie_ and getting drunk, which was really the same thing. Paula had called to say she had to stay home with her kids, who were sick, or maybe they had gotten _her_ sick, Rebecca had already started drinking by then, though she had tried calling Josh not long after that and got cut off by Heather and Valencia for her trouble.

They had gotten most of the way through the second season, Heather was snoring on the ground somewhere near the couch, and Rebecca couldn’t stop thinking about how much better Grace and Frankie had it without men.

“Totally,” Valencia had agreed, and then they had started ranting about how useless men were, and what did they need them for anyway, and name one thing men did that a girl friend couldn’t do and better at that.

“Well, orgasms, for one thing,” Valencia had said, and that had been pretty much that.

 

 

 

Seeing the text— _Wanna get drinks on Friday?_ from Jenny—had been an accident. They had the same phone, and when a half-asleep Rebecca had heard the text notification while Valencia was in the shower, she had grabbed the phone and seen the text preview before she had noticed it had the wrong background to be her phone.

So seeing the text had been an accident.

Going through Valencia's contacts to get a full name and stalk “Jenny” online had been a bit more purposeful.

“Jenny” was just shy of thirty, single, had a thriving business as a florist, and was very friendly with Valencia—though how friendly could they be, if Valencia had never mentioned her—

“She has, though?” Heather said. “She used to take one of Valencia’s classes, and now Valencia uses her for the flowers and floral arrangements and all that for the weddings?”

In any case, it was all very suspicious.

“How,” Heather said with zero inflection. “How is any of this suspicious. Why are you ordering a wig. Rebecca. Rebecca. Move away from the computer. I’m calling Valencia!”

 

 

 

Rebecca wasn’t gay, was the thing.

She would know, if she was, wouldn’t she, and she wouldn’t feel like she had so many times, with Greg and Josh and Robert, like she’d have nothing if they didn’t want her, like she’d _be_ nothing. And she wasn’t like Darryl, she’d never noticed girls that way, really, and the thing with Valencia was just—

“You do end up here a lot,” said Candi with an I, though that was a stage name. “I’m a bubbly blonde stripper,” she had told Rebecca, “I have to have a bubbly blonde stripper name.”

—friends helping each other out, why should straight guys have the monopoly on that excuse, and she didn’t understand why her mother was always asking whether she was—

“You’re obviously going through something, but you do know we don’t open until like, way later, right?” Candi with an I said.

—and alright, Rebecca knew all about compulsory heterosexuality, but _she_ wasn’t—she would _know_ —

“Ah,” Candi with an I said, sounding relieved, “I think that’s your friend come to get you.”

 

 

 

Valencia was not a morning person. Valencia did not enjoy getting a call at nine in the morning that her girl friend—or girlfriend, what did Heather know, since no one ever told her anything, though if they could please stop having sex on the couch—that Rebecca was having some sort of breakdown over Valencia having other friends, or something. Heather wasn’t a morning person either. And what was that about a strip club?

“I’m not having a breakdown over you having friends,” Rebecca said. She didn’t know how to explain how her brain worked, how everything felt transient, fragile, like the slightest tremor would bring all the walls down around her. She didn’t know how to tell Valencia that she’d never learned how to hold on to people in a way that wouldn’t make them want to leave.

Valencia made a huffing sound, and lay down next to Rebecca on the bed. “I don’t get what you’re worried about. You were kind of my first friend, you know.” Rebecca turned on her side to look at her, but she was determinedly staring at the ceiling. “I didn’t have girl friends, because they were always jealous of me, or because I was jealous of them, a bit, sometimes, and guys certainly never wanted to be friends with me. So I was—I was really happy, when you wanted to be my friend. But when you kissed me that first time, I felt like… like you were just one more person who didn't want me for me. And then it turned out it was all about Josh anyway…”

“It wasn’t,” Rebecca interrupted, heart in her mouth. “I—Trying to be your friend, yeah, but—I wasn’t thinking about anything when I kissed you. I just… I just wanted to.” Valencia had been so close, and she smelled so nice, and looked so pretty, and she smiled at Rebecca like she really meant it, and maybe Rebecca _did_ notice girls, sometimes.

Valencia hesitated, then said: “I… I like how we are. I don’t want to stop. So you don’t have to worry. About that. If you did. I don’t… I don’t like anyone more than I like you.”

 

 

 

Rebecca was supposed to go back to therapy after the wedding that didn’t happen, but she hadn’t. She had driven there, but she couldn’t make herself get out of the car.

After a while, the passenger door had opened and Dr. Akopian had sat down next to her.

“Why does everyone leave?” Rebecca had asked eventually. She kept coming back to this over and over. What was in her that made her unlovable?

“Not everyone,” Dr. Akopian had said gently.

 

 

 

Rebecca sometimes felt like she’d spent her whole life holding on to people with both hands only to end up alone anyway. Even when they stayed she could never trust it: surely if she let down her guard for a minute, if she stopped lying and scheming, if she made a mistake, if she let go for a moment to just be herself… Surely they would leave—and they did, every time. Her father had left, Greg had left, Josh had left.

But Paula was still here, and Heather, and Darryl. And somehow Valencia was still here, too. Valencia who had seen all the ugly parts of her that she took such great care never to show; Valencia whose relationship she had tried to wreck over and over—and Valencia knew it, had known it all along, and still forgave her.

Valencia wanted to hold on to her, too.

 

 

 

She ran into Josh at the ice cream parlor.

Not literally, though it felt like she _had_ run into him, or gotten run over herself. She could feel all the old impulses waking up, reflexively looking for an angle, what she could say or do to make him want her again, but for the first time it was easy not to give into it, like there was nothing behind the thought of it really, just that this path had been so well-travelled in her mind she couldn’t help being aware of it, even when she had no intention to go down that road again.

She didn’t want him anymore. She’d told herself that but she hadn’t truly believed it until now.

She could see him struggling to think of something to say other than to ask how she was doing; they hadn’t talked since he’d called to make clumsy apologies two days after the wedding that didn’t happen and she had threatened to—

Well. Paula had taken the phone and hung up before she could really get going, anyway.

“How have you been?” she asked first, smiling, because she didn’t want to maneuver him into wanting her back anymore, but that didn’t mean she wanted him to feel sorry for her either.

“Good,” he said, awkward but sincere, and it didn’t hurt anymore, to remember all the reasons she had liked him for so long. He tugged at the collar of his habit, and smiled a bit. “I don’t really know what I’m doing, and no one seems to think I can do it, but—I want to stick it out, you know? I want to try.”

“Well, I’m rooting for you,” Rebecca said, and even managed to mean it, mostly, and then the guy behind the counter gave Josh his order and he left and it was over, just like that. It was really over.

“What took you so long,” Valencia whined from the couch, still where Rebecca had left her half an hour ago. She looked honestly terrible, in Rebecca’s stretched-out sweatpants and sweatshirt, her hair an unwashed mess, and she’d been a pain all day since she’d woken up with period cramps, constantly ordering Rebecca about, wanting this or that, and her tea was too hot, and now it wasn’t hot enough, and what she really wanted was ice cream, except now she wasn’t sure she really liked mango ice cream, and why wasn’t Rebecca immediately scheduling her an hysterectomy to make it all stop, didn’t she love her?

“I do,” Rebecca said, almost without thinking. Valencia stared at her, upside down, without saying anything. It was harder than it had been with Josh to put the bad thoughts away, the _is it too soon_ , _should I take it back_ , _make her think I meant to say something else_ , _stupid stupid stupid_ —

Rebecca had swallowed those three words back so many times in the last few weeks, since they had decided to try for real. She didn’t want to hold back anymore.

She took a deep breath, and then another, and Valencia was still staring at her, but Rebecca only said, voice as steady as she could make it: “I do love you. Is that okay?”

Valencia looked down at herself. “You say that to me _now_?” she moaned, and turned to hide her face in a throw pillow. She made grouchy noises for half a minute then stuck out her hand in the air, waving it around until Rebecca got the message and reached out to take it.

“Yes,” Valencia said, voice muffled, as she tangled their fingers together. “It’s okay.”

Eventually they let go to sat up together and eat before the ice cream melted, Valencia making piteous noises until Rebecca shared her chocolate cone with her, then letting her have some of Valencia’s ice cream, and then they cuddled on the couch and Valencia started up _Grace and Frankie_ again while Rebecca rubbed her belly, and all the while Rebecca kept thinking about everything Paula and Dr. Akopian had ever told her, and what Josh had said in the ice cream parlor just before.

Rebecca wanted to try, too. She really wanted to try, and keep trying.

 

 

 

 


End file.
